Che Guevara in Punta del Este: Cuba's forcefulness

 

August 8 marks the 62nd anniversary of Ernesto Che Guevara’s historic speech at the 5th Plenary Session of the Inter-American Economic and Social Council held on August 7 to 17, 1961, in Punta del Este, Uruguay, under imperial dictates intended to fuel the Cuban Revolution’s continental isolation.

As a leader of the Revolutionary Government, the mythical guerrilla was Cuba’s clear and forceful voice at the meeting which, as he denounced from day one, used technicalities and economicisms to conceal its original political designs, namely to corner the free and sovereign country that disobeyed the provisions of the Monroe Doctrine.

Since on the eve of the conference the organizers had already made their true intentions public, Cuba had every right to speak there about politics, because the economic issues were also political, as José Martí had said and Che Guevara pointedly recalled at the forum. Besides, the Punta del Este meeting was expressly organized against Cuba and, especially, the fortitude of its example, at a time when the whole world, not only America, was living amid great tension and the United States wished to secure its continental rearguard.

From every perspective, Cuba saw economy and politics as closely linked, so the Island’s representative would assert his right to speak on both subjects.

Che Guevara pointed out a paradox: like it or not, if they were speaking there of new times in continental relations—the only thing on which he agreed with the organizers—those changes were actually taking place to the beat of the Cuban drum. In other words, he explained that the triumph of the Cuban Revolution and its example were serving as a sort of lesson to the traditional policy of blatant disregard for the nations from Rio Grande to Patagonia. In line with its hegemonic interests, the Watchdog was hurrying to put on makeup and brutally isolate Cuba.

This had been going on since January 1959, but in April 1961, the United States had suffered its first defeat in America with the Cuban victory at Bay of Pigs over a group of mercenaries organized and armed to the teeth by that power, as its president was forced to admit publicly.

Guevara mentioned this and summarized the sustained series of irrefutable aggressions, sabotage and terrorist acts promoted by the CIA and the Pentagon against Cuba to topple the Revolutionary Government, which was leading changes and fair transformations and becoming a beacon for the peoples of America.

The Cuban representative in Punta del Este described the most notorious acts, including the suspension of Cuba's sugar quota in the U.S market in December 1960 and the refusal of American refineries in Cuba to process oil coming from the USSR after the U.S. stopped supplying it.

Then the policemen of America held a meeting in Costa Rica, fully condoned by the OAS, in which they led sister countries to condemn Cuba for trading with the Soviet Union and purchasing arms to defend itself from so many attacks, on grounds that it was establishing relations with an extra-continental power.
Che Guevara recalled the Cuban Apostle’s words that only the nation that traded with more than one of its equals, be they kingdoms, monarchies or republics, would be free and democratic, and said that such was Cuba’s end: open up to and trade with the world with sovereignty and solidarity.

Guevara’s foresight was highly important to anticipate both the failure of the plan called Alliance for Progress, hastily hatched and presented there to counteract Cuba's example, and the attempts to isolate the Island, which at first sight would have seemed a serious obstacle to overcome.

History records a precedent from 1959, when Fidel Castro raised at the Conference of the Group of 21, held in Buenos Aires, the urgent need for the region to discuss funds for development, which the U.S. had provided to Europe and the Middle East, and asked, "Why not come to the real conclusion that public funding is the best way to facilitate cooperation today?” And he answered himself by saying that such funds had always been insufficient and should be increased.

At Punta del Este, Guevara explained Cuba's goals regarding economic planning and social development in Latin America, the Agrarian Reform, industrialization, the unfeasibility of subordinating health conditions to development, and the conditions to grant and use foreign financial aid. Likewise, he firmly decried the plots to attack the Cuban economy and prevent the country from getting resources.

On behalf of Cuba, he put forward suggestions to boost joint regional actions focused on development in a true spirit of solidarity, convinced that none of the resources and benefits that would be granted would be available to Cuba at the U.S.’s behest.

More than 60 years after that plan, Latin America and the Caribbean still need Guevara’s measures to be implemented, although many things have changed, as is well known. The struggle for development as a guarantor of freedom and democracy remains a hope, the reason that Guevara's ideas are astonishingly current, if you know how to look for them.